


Rockford, Illinois

by frankiesin



Series: Ghost Towns [1]
Category: Bandom, Green Day, Panic! at the Disco
Genre: Alternate Universe - 1980s, Gen, Green Day is a monster hunting squad, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Jon is a Witch, Jon is only a child why did I do this to him, Minor Character Death, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, tragic backstories
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-27
Updated: 2017-02-27
Packaged: 2018-09-27 08:20:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,179
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9985022
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/frankiesin/pseuds/frankiesin
Summary: Jon, a young witch, survives a supernatural attack on his friends and his family, and then later gets involved with a group of professional monster hunters.(part of the Polyam Panic! Unholyverse AU)





	

**Author's Note:**

> I know that Jon says he's from Chicago for all of this even though he's actually from a suburb, but trust me, that's just what people do. I say I'm from Atlanta all the time, but really I'm like 15-20 minutes north of Atlanta. 
> 
> Other than that, enjoy!

Jon and his three friends, Tom, Cassie and Alex, were sitting in Jon’s living room. The fireplace had been turned off, but they’d lit candles so they weren’t entirely in the dark. Between the three of them, there was a ouija board and an open book. It was Halloween, and it had been Alex’s idea to try and mess with spirits. They were at Jon’s house because the four of them always met up at Jon’s house, and Jon had gotten his parents to leave them alone for the night.

 

It was dark outside. It was cold inside, and Jon and Cassie had brought out a blanket to huddle under. The other two boys were trying to hide their shivers, because they didn’t want to come across as being a pussy. Jon had long ago stopped trying to be tough. He was a soft guy. He was nice and he felt things. It wasn’t necessarily a bad thing.  

 

“Are you ready?” Alex asked. He was grinning, and his face was lit up by the flickering of the candles. 

 

The other three nodded, and pressed their fingers to the glass. Alex took a deep breath. “Okay, remember, don’t take your hand off until the very end, because if you do, then whatever we’re talking to can come out and then we’ll be fucked.”

 

“Ghosts aren’t real,” Tom said, rolling his eyes. “But, sure, let’s pretend.”

Tom and Cassie were two grades above Jon, and Alex was a year above Jon. Jon’s birthday was in the fall, though, so he was pretty much the same age as Alex and thus had never been treated like a kid. 

 

“We can find out,” Jon said. He nodded to Alex. “Ask if there’s anyone here.”

Alex nodded, and pressed his fingers down harder to the board. “Is anyone here? We’re not bad, we just want to say hi.”

 

“Ghosts don’t just say hi,” Cassie said. “Ask him something interesting.”

 

Tom rolled his eyes. 

 

The pointer moved towards  _ yes _ . Cassie let out a gasp and almost withdrew her finger, but Jon dropped his other hand down on her wrist to stop her. “Don’t let go. Alex, ask it who it is.”

 

“Wh-who are you?” Alex asked. 

 

“This can’t be real,” Tom said. 

 

_ I-T I-S _ , the board said. Someone let out a little scream. Jon wasn’t sure who it was. He was too focused on the board. 

 

Jon swallowed, ignoring how his heart was beating in his chest and how his fingertips were getting sweaty from nerves. “Who are you? What’s your name?”

 

_ W-H-Y D-O Y-O-U C-A-R-E W-I-T-C-H _

 

“You’re a witch?” Tom said. Jon wanted to deny it, because he didn’t want to admit to his friends that he knew more about this kind of stuff than they did. He didn’t want them to know that he had bottles and herbs in his room for spells and the occasional curse. 

 

_ J-O-N W-A-L-K-E-R C-U-R-S-E-D Y-O-U-R G-I-R-L _

 

“Dude, what the fuck?” Tom said. He pulled his hand back before Jon could stop him. 

 

“Tom, no!” Alex shouted, but it was too late. The glass cracked under their fingers and splintered away. Something cold and whooshy shot out of the board, taking the candles out with it. Jon grabbed the spell book that Alex had brought, because he was hoping that it would have some way to banish the ghost. 

 

Jon hadn’t gotten into witchcraft with the intention of stopping a ghost. He’d started practicing witchcraft two summers ago because he wanted to impress his friends at Halloween one year. 

 

“What do you want?!” Cassie yelled at the ghost. They were all in the dark, except for Cassie, who had a whistle, pepper spray, and a tiny flashlight clipped to her belt at all times. Her parents were paranoid that she’d get raped on the streets of Chicago or something. Jon was just glad that she had a flashlight so that they weren’t all in the dark. 

 

_ I want to finish what I started years ago _ , the ghost said. It’s voice echoed through the room, and Jon shivered despite himself. It was cold, but not that cold. The ghost was messing with things. 

 

Jon turned to his friends. “You guys should get out of here. I don’t think it’s friendly.”

 

_ I am only friendly to those who deserve it _ , the ghost said.  _ No one in this room is worthy of my respect, and so you all will face my wrath _ . 

 

“That doesn’t sound good,” Jon said. 

 

“No shit,” Alex said, reaching for Cassie’s arm. “Are you coming with, dude?”

 

Jon shook his head. His parents and his younger brother were upstairs, asleep. He wasn’t about to leave them behind just so that he could safely get out alive. He told his friends that, and then bolted towards the stairs. Everyone in his family could sleep through a hurricane. Something as quiet as an angry ghost wouldn’t wake them up. 

 

As Jon got to the top of the stairs, he heard a blood-curdling scream, followed by Cassie shouting, “oh my God! No!” and then more screaming. Jon froze. His friends were in trouble. His family was also in trouble. He didn’t know who to help. 

_ You’ll never save them, witch boy _ , the ghost said as the screaming calmed down to pitiful whimpering and sobbing.  _ You’ll never save any of them. I’m going to kill you all. _

 

“No you won’t,” Jon hissed to the empty stairwell. He was fourteen, barely, but he wasn’t going to lose to someone who was already dead. He bolted up the stairs and into his parents room, yelling. “Mom! Dad! You have to get out, now!”

 

“Jon?” His dad said, tired and not fully aware. His mom was rolling onto her side like she wanted it all to be a dream. His dad sat up slowly and reached out for his glasses. “Son, what’s going on?”

 

“Something… there’s a ghost, and it’s coming up here and it’s going to kill you both,” Jon said breathlessly. “You guys have to get out of here!”

 

“Jon, sweetie, go back to bed,” his mom said. “It was just a nightmare.”

 

“It’s not a nightmare, mom, it’s really happening!” Jon said. He held the book tighter to his chest. He needed everyone to get out so that he could find the right spell and get rid of the ghost. 

 

Below them, the screaming started back up. It was Alex, and Jon could tell that he was in a lot of pain. He pulled at his dad’s arm. “Please, you guys need to get out. Please just trust me.”

 

His dad started to get out of the bed, thankfully, and so Jon left them alone to go get his brother. There was more screaming from below, along with the sounds of something being crushed. Jon squeezed his eyes shut for a moment, hoping that he was wrong about everything and that this was just a prank or something. 

 

He knew it wasn’t. Ghosts were real. Ouija boards worked. Jon’s friends were probably dead or dying. Jon needed to save someone. He wasn’t ready to let this thing win.

 

He grabbed his brother by his shoulders and shook him awake, telling him to go to their parents and stay with them. Jon’s brother nodded and left the room, and then Jon was alone with his spellbook and his rapidly beating heart. He took a deep breath and opened it up, flipping through the pages to find what he needed. 

 

He could still hear the screaming. There was also crying. 

 

Jon wiped his face, gritting his teeth and trying not to cry. He was terrified, but he had to fix this. He had to save someone. 

 

He found it, and ripped the page out because he didn’t want to have to cart the book around while he tried to remove an angry ghost from his house. Jon had to get to the basement, but there was no way to do that without going past the spirit. He took a deep breath, folded the page so that he could put it in his pocket, and headed for the stairs. 

 

Jon held back a gasp of terror when he reached the bottom of the stairs. His three friends were still alive, but their limbs had been snapped and twisted around so that they couldn’t move. They were set up around the kitchen table, and there were pathways of blood leading away from the table to where they’d been maimed. 

 

“Jon…” Alex croaked out. Jon put a finger to his lips. He didn’t want the spirit to know where he was. He knew he wouldn’t have the advantage of surprise for long, but he wanted to keep it while he could. Jon walked over to his friends and carefully picked up Cassie first. They’d known each other the longest, and she looked like she was in the most pain. Her head was also bleeding, and it looked like a chunk of her hair had been ripped out. 

 

Cassie dropped her head to his shoulder. “What’re you doing?”

 

“I’m getting you guys out of here,” Jon said, heading towards the door. Cassie was shaking her head, though, but Jon ignored her. She was bleeding and in a lot of pain. Jon didn’t know a lot about medical stuff, because he’d never cared for crime shows and stuff as a kid, but he was pretty sure she wasn’t in a good state of mind. 

 

The front door was locked when Jon got to it. Jon let out a soft, “fuck,” before carefully setting Cassie down. He tried to unlock it, but it wouldn’t budge, and there weren’t any keys near by. Jon heard someone screaming upstairs, and he whirled around. That was his family. He looked down at Cassie. “I have to get you out of here. I have to save you guys.”

 

_ You will save no one, you heathen _ , the ghost said, and then Jon felt cold fingers wrapping around his neck. Jon sprinted forward, his heart racing as he tried to get away from the ghost’s grip. 

 

The ghost threw him against the wall, and Jon heard the wall crack behind him. His whole body hurt, and he shook for a moment before starting to stand again. He could see the ghost: it was a soft white outline of a man. He looked like he was from the 1920’s, and there was a crowbar sticking through his chest. That was important. The crowbar might be what was connecting him to the world. 

 

Jon glanced to his left. The door to the basement was open. All of his family’s storage was in the basement, as well as all the weird things they’d found when they’d moved in. Jon just had to go down there, find what was holding this guy to Earth, and throw it in the fire while saying the right words.

 

Easy.

 

Not easy.

 

The basement door slammed shut behind him, trapping Jon in the dark. Jon swore under his breath, wishing he had thought to grab a flashlight on his way down. He pressed his hand to the wall and carefully made his way down the stairs. There was a single lightbulb down at the bottom of the stairs, and it lit up the basement. Jon pulled the tassel, turning the light on and casting the basement into a dim yellow glow. 

 

His family had a lot of weird storage items. 

 

He moved through all of his and his brother’s old toys, to the three cardboard boxes in the back that held various items his parents had found when they’d moved into the house. 

 

He could hear more screams coming from upstairs, so he ripped open the first box and started digging. There wasn’t a crowbar. 

 

“Fuck,” Jon whispered, ripping open the next box. “Where is it?”

 

He opened the next box and just dumped everything out on the floor, kicking it around with his feet to try and find the crowbar faster. He did find it, except he kicked it with his bare toe and that was a mistake. Jon sat down and held his foot for a moment, glaring at the crowbar and knowing it was the object tying this ghost to Earth. The crowbar was an asshole. Jon was not going to feel bad about burning it. 

 

He grabbed it and pulled the torn book page from his pocket, wrapping the paper around the crowbar and then his hand around both items. 

 

_ Clever boy _ , he heard the ghost say. Jon shivered, and swung the crowbar towards the coldness as hard as he could. The ghost disappeared, though, and Jon ended up smashing the wall with a crowbar. He grimaced and pulled it out.

 

His dad would understand, later. Jon wasn’t being a rambunctious kid. He was just trying to save everyone’s lives.

 

Jon bolted for the stairs, crowbar in hand. The door at the top was still locked, so Jon just started swinging the crowbar at the wood until it broke. Then he used the crowbar to pull away at it until he had a large enough gap to crawl through. His parents were so going to be pissed at him. Jon was just hoping they wouldn’t ground him. He was trying to save their lives, after all. 

 

He was greeted by the corpse of his mom. Her chest had been ripped open and her ribs were sticking out everywhere, and the words  _ stop trying _ were written on the wall above her in her own blood. It was pretty gruesome. Her eyes were wide open and staring at Jon. He closed his eyes, turned away, and tried not to cry.

 

Okay. So he couldn’t save his mom. There were still five people left. Jon could do this.

 

He headed back to the living room, even though that was probably the most dangerous room in the house. It had a lot of heavy furniture, and a fireplace. At least there weren’t any knives, not that that seemed to matter to this ghost. 

 

Jon lit the fireplace and then moved away from it while he waited for the fire to get large enough that he could drop the crowbar into it and say the spell to get rid of the ghost. His heart was pounding in his chest. He wanted to go check on his friends, to make sure that they weren’t dead like his mom, but he knew better than to leave the fire alone. The ghost could easily spread it and burn the whole house down. 

 

Finally, it was large enough. Jon stood up, crowbar in one hand and the page from the spell book in his other hand.

 

_ Are you sure you want to do that? _ He heard the ghost say.  _ Don’t you want to see what I’ve done to your friends? _

 

“I’ll check on them in a moment,” Jon said, and then screamed. A body had just been flung at him. Well, part of a body. The head and the legs were missing. Jon was sprayed with blood, some of it getting in his mouth. Jon spat it out, wiping his face aggressively to get it all off. 

 

_ That was someone I knew! _ Jon thought. The arms were thrown next, but Jon raised his hands above his head so that he wasn’t hit with anything. He was going to be sick. This ghost--this really, really pissed off ghost--was throwing body parts at him. 

 

_ You didn’t save them, _ the ghost cackled, throwing the head. It was Tom. Jon threw up in his mouth a little, but he swallowed it back because now was not the time to mentally break down and start hyperventilating on the floor. He could do that later. He had to get out, now.

 

_ You heard them screaming, and you let them die, _ the ghost continued.  _ You were too caught up in your magic tricks to care about them. You never cared about them. _

 

“Shut up!” Jon yelled, and hurled the crowbar into the fire. It was metal, so it didn’t burn. The ghost shrieked though, and things started falling off the walls. Pictures of Jon’s family, of Jon and his brother when they won trophies for soccer. Jon’s grandmother, before she died in a nursing home two years ago. 

 

Jon was thrown forward, towards the fireplace. He reached out, holding himself back so that he didn’t go face first into the fire. His hands scraped against the brick, and the flames licked at his cheeks and jaw. Jon struggled to lean back, away from the flames and the heat, but the ghost’s power was strong and he could feel the fire against his face. It burned. Jon squeezed his eyes shut, trying not to cry. He wasn’t going to die, not after he’d come this far. He was going to survive.

 

His hands were bleeding from where he’d been gripping the rough bricks, and his arms were getting sore from holding himself away from the flames. Jon took a deep breath, regretting it when he inhaled the heat and smoke of the fire, and flung himself back with the strength of one arm. His head hit the bricks and he scratched his right arm badly, but he was no longer face to face with the flames. 

 

Jon ripped the paper open and read the spell out loud, as quickly as he could. His throat burned, and his voice was dry and crackled all the time, but he could feel it working. 

 

Beside him, the fire turned black and burst from the fireplace, scorching the floor. Blood dripped from Jon’s nose and his head throbbed. His vision went blurry as he read the final lines, and it felt like someone was squeezing his skull. He managed to get the final words out before he fell over, the page fluttering away into the fire and the coldness of his house disappearing into the night. 

 

* * *

 

Jon woke up in a hospital bed. He looked down at his hands, only to see that they were bandaged up. There was a mask over his face, and he could hear his own ragged breathing. There were bandages on his head and his arm. He could hear the heart monitor beeping quietly in the background.

 

He was alive.

 

He was entirely alone.

 

He had no idea what was going on or if anyone else had made it out alive. He looked around, hoping for some kind of button or bell he could press to get a doctor to come answer his questions, but there wasn’t one. The heart monitor was getting louder. Jon’s breathing was getting louder. He was starting to cry.

 

The door opened and a man with salt and pepper hair came in. He was wearing a lab coat and he had large, round glasses down at the tip of his nose. He pushed them up as he crossed the room to Jon and pulled up a chair. He sat down in the chair and introduced himself as a Dr. Redwood. He had a clipboard in his hands. “How are you feeling, Jon?”

 

Jon attempted to point to the breathing mask over his face, but his fingers were stiff and held down by bandages, so he just sadly waved at his own face. 

 

Dr. Redwood nodded and said, “we can take the mask off, now that you’re conscious again,” he reached forward to do it himself, “you gave my nurses a scare for a minute, when your heart rate sped up like that. I’m glad it was just you waking up, though.”

 

“Did anyone survive?” Jon tried to get out. His throat was too dry to speak, though, so he ended up croaking. Dr. Redwood handed him a cup of water, and helped Jon drink it down. Jon swallowed, coughed a little, and repeated his question.

 

Dr. Redwood frowned, “Jon, I’m sorry…”

 

“I was trying to save them, I promise,” Jon said, choking on tears this time. He pressed his hands to his face and tried to calm down. This was a stranger. Jon didn’t want to lose his shit in front of a stranger. “I should have just gotten them out. I don’t know why I thought I could save them.”

 

“Jon, none of this is your fault,” Dr. Redwood said. 

 

It sure felt like it was, though, and that was what really mattered to Jon. He was fourteen, and an orphan. His brother and his three best friends were all dead, and it was because he thought he was good enough to save them. Before that Halloween night, the most impressive thing Jon had ever done was to give Tom’s ex-girlfriend a really bad case of acne. 

 

She’d cheated on him, and he and Cassie had found out. Jon had just had the means to deal with it. 

 

The next few weeks blurred together. Since Jon was a minor, he couldn’t be let out on his own, but his grandparents were two states away (in the suburbs of Cincinnati). They were his legal guardians now, but they couldn’t just take him away. There was also the question of what would happen to Jon’s parents’ stuff, like the house and his dad’s station wagon. 

 

Jon left the hospital a week before Thanksgiving. He’d been unofficially pulled out of his school for the rest of the semester, and was told that he would start back whenever he was ready. 

 

“You’ve been through a very traumatic event,” the psychiatrist said to him. Jon hated the psychiatrist. She never believed anything Jon said, and kept telling him that he was repressing what happened on Halloween night because it had scared him too. Jon hadn’t repressed a thing. He remembered it all in perfect clarity. It was the only thing he dreamed about now. He could still feel the cold, and taste the blood of his friend’s ripped apart body as it was hurled at him.

 

Jon needed more than a psychiatrist and a semester off of school. He needed a total reset on his life. 

 

He was quiet in the car, all the way from Chicago to Cincinnati. His grandparents didn’t try to make him talk. They helped him set up his room (his hands were ripped up and burned slightly, as was part of his lower face and his right arm) and gave him a TV and a stack of comic books. His grandmother was retired, but his grandfather still worked as a history teacher for the local high school.

 

Jon laid down on his new bed and stared up at the ceiling. He’d brought his spell book with him, but not the ouija board. He would never touch one of those things again, not unless he absolutely had to. 

 

* * *

 

It was January. Jon told his grandparents that he wanted to go back to school because he didn’t want to fall behind on his studies. That was a lie. Jon wanted to go back to school so he’d have something to do other than sit around in their house and think about all of the funerals he had had to attend that winter. His parents had been buried next to each other, and then his brother had been buried beside them. It was a joint funeral. Jon’s whole family was there. All of them cried.

 

The caskets were all closed. Jon never got to see the other corpses. He didn’t want to. He knew that it was bad. The Walker family liked to be able to drop flowers into the caskets of their fallen loved ones, so that when their loved ones got to heaven, they wouldn’t be empty handed. 

 

Jon’s brother had a child’s casket, which was significantly smaller than his parents casket. Jon started sobbing when he noticed the size difference, and he didn’t stop even after the funeral was over.

 

His grandparents told him he didn’t have to go to his friends’ funerals if it was going to be too much. Jon went anyway. He hugged their parents, he told them he was sorry, and at Alex’s, he spent the reception throwing up in the bathroom and shaking uncontrollably because all he could see was his friend’s arms and head being thrown at him by a ghost.

 

It was a new year, though, and Jon needed to recover. 

 

He packed up his backpack and caught the bus, just like he was a normal eighth grade boy and he hadn’t just witnessed a massacre. The police thought it was some crazy person hopped up on drugs and the Halloween spirit. They tried to put Jon in an asylum when he told them it was a ghost. Jon’s grandmother quickly said that Jon was just traumatised and trying to make sense of the incident. Jon let it go, because he didn’t want to be locked up somewhere.

 

No one sat beside him on the bus, which was fine because Jon had his Walkman and the new Beastie Boys record turned up as high as it could go. He didn’t want friends. Not yet. He needed some time to become someone new, someone who wasn’t so scared and shaky and who would get nauseous at the smallest thing. 

 

School was mundane. Jon had always been a slightly above average kid, nothing special, unless it involved music. That didn’t change here. His grandparents had put him in the school’s band, even though Jon only had a semester of middle school left. Jon didn’t care. He was glad to be in band, playing trumpet and sitting fourth chair because the band director had no idea who he was yet.

 

He made it through a month before things went bad. At the beginning of February, a girl hung herself because her boyfriend left her for some other girl a week before Valentine’s Day. They’d both been goths, so the rest of the school wasn’t surprised, but it freaked Jon out. 

 

The girl had been on his bus route. She’d sat two seats in front of Jon, and after she died, he couldn’t take the bus anymore. He was paranoid that he’d see here, hanging from the bus or something. The other kids on the bus had always made fun of her and thrown stuff at her and tried to cut her hair off. Jon wondered if she’d killed herself because of her boyfriend or if it was because of the bullying. 

 

He was walking home--it was about a thirty minute walk--when he spotted the library. It was small, nestled back behind a bunch of trees, and there were only a few cars in the parking lot. Most of them were nice, but one stuck out. It was a classic Mustang, missing a rear light, and with what looked like giant scratch marks down the side. 

 

Jon walked up to it, running his fingers over the scratches. 

 

“They’re from a close call with a werewolf,” he heard someone say. Jon jumped up, grabbing for some weapon he didn’t actually have, and turned around. He stared up at a man with dyed black hair and a crooked smile. Jon had no idea how old the guy was, because he looked like he was in high school but he also had a cigarette between his fingers and he was dressed like he worked in an office. A cooler version of an office guy, though. 

 

Jon crossed his arms over his chest. “Werewolves aren’t real.”

 

“They are, actually,” the guy said. “Hate to break it to you, but most things that go bump in the night are. I’m Billie, by the way.”

 

“Jon,” he said. He probably shouldn’t have been talking to strangers, but they were in a library parking lot, and Jon could see people inside. Besides, this guy didn’t look dangerous at all. He had some really ugly scars on his arm, though. They looked eerily similar to those on the car. Jon pointed at Billie’s arm. “Is that from a werewolf too?”

 

“Yeah,” Billie said. “We specialise in werewolves.”

 

“What do you mean?” Jon asked. “Are you, like, a monster hunter or something?”

 

“I thought you didn’t believe in werewolves.”

 

“I never said I do,” Jon said. He raised his chin. He wasn’t scared of people. He was more afraid of ghosts. “But you do. Do you believe in ghosts, too, or is it just werewolves and vampires and stuff like that?”

 

“I’ll believe pretty much anything,” Billie said. He dropped his cigarette to the ground and tapped it out with his foot. He was a really small guy. He just also happened to be wearing some eyeliner, or he had really deep bags under his eyes. “What about you? Do you believe in ghosts?”

 

“Um, yeah, I guess,” Jon said. “No one else believes me when I talk about them, though, so I don’t see why it matters.”

 

“Do you want to help me out with a ghost problem?” Billie asked. 

 

Jon tensed up, thinking about bodies and blood and fire licking at his face and how sometimes it still hurt. “How am I supposed to help? I’m just a kid.”

 

“She’s not angry, if that make you feel better,” Billie said. He turned back towards the library, and motioned for Jon to follow him. Jon considered his options. If this guy was actually a monster hunter, then he’d know what he was doing and he might be able to help Jon with his own nightmares. And, if not, Jon could just make up an excuse and go home. 

 

Jon followed Billie into the library, back to a corner table where two other guys--who were obviously in their late twenties--were sitting and reading over newspapers. There was also a black studded journal between them, with the name  _ Carla _ scrawled on it in a scratchy print. Billie offered Jon a chair. “Mike, Tre, this is Jon. He believes in ghosts and not werewolves, and he might be able to help.”

 

The man with intense sideburns and an angular face looked Jon up and down. Jon pulled out his spell book, like that would give him more credibility. Sideburns raised an eyebrow. “Is this Chicago Jon?”

 

Jon frowned and pulled his book closer. “How’d you know I was from Chicago?”

 

The other one grinned. “It is you! Holy shit!”

 

“Tre, don’t be an ass,” Billie said. “The kid just lost his parents.”

 

Jon scooted away from them, his heart beating rapidly in his chest. “How do you know who I am?”

 

“It was your idea, dude, you explain,” Sideburns said to Billie. 

 

Billie set down the journal that he had just opened and turned so that he was facing Jon straight on. He crinkled a page of the journal between his fingers. “Alright, so, quick backstory here, I grew up in a haunted farmhouse in Oklahoma. Tre and Mike have their own weird spooky backstories, but the three of us have been doing ghost hunting and monster hunting since the seventies. And for the most part, it’s been the three of us, but eventually, we’re all going to either get old or die, and we don’t want all of the shit we’ve learned to just disappear. We’ve been working on a giant network, across the entire country, for people who have an interest in the supernatural or who’ve survived a supernatural experience to help other people.”

 

“That sounds… cool,” Jon said slowly. “But how’d you find me?”

 

“An unsolved murder of five people, one survivor who barely survived, a house wrecked beyond the normal burglary, and the only witness claiming it was a ghost,” Billie said. “Supernatural shit was the only explanation, so we started following your trail to see what you were up to, and then we got distracted by the suicide--”

 

“The girl’s still here, but she’s not mad, she’s just trying to send a message and we’re trying to figure out what that message is,” Tre said. 

 

“--yeah,” Billie said, nodding to his friend. “But we were here to talk to you. No offense, but you shouldn’t have survived that, let alone gotten rid of the spirit. What are you hiding up your sleeve, kid?”

 

“I’m a witch,” Jon said. “I’m not very good, or anything, but I can do pretty much any spell in this book,” Jon tapped the book with his finger, “and I had a bunch of supplies in my old house, before everyone died.”

 

“I was not expecting the answer to be witch,” Mike said. He nodded in approval, though, and motioned for Jon’s book. Jon handed it over, and Mike flipped through it while Tre and Billie peered over his shoulder. They weren’t at all discrete. It was kind of funny. Mike raised his eyebrows. “You can do  _ all  _ of these?”

 

“Theoretically,” Jon said. There were some in there for raising demons and necromancy and stuff like that. Jon knew how to do them, but he’d never tried to. He didn’t want to raise anything from the dead. That seemed like a bad idea.

 

“There’s some complicated stuff in here,” Mike said. “I’m impressed.”

 

“Mike’s from a coven,” Billie explained. “There are a lot of witches up in Oregon, apparently.”

 

“You’ve been to Oregon?” Jon asked. He’d never been anywhere other than Chicago and now Cincinnati. He didn’t know a lot about Oregon, but it was far away and seemed cool because of that.

 

Tre and Billie shook their heads. Billie said, “one of the rules for this thing is that we never go back to our hometown. If you want to be a part of this, that’s gonna have to be Chicago and here, since your grandparents are here and they’d probably ask a bunch of questions if you disappeared for a few years and then randomly showed up again.”

 

“That makes sense,” Jon said. “So, what do you need me for? You guys are professionals.”

 

“We need someone who doesn’t scare her,” Tre said. “Billie tried dressing up like one of her goth friends, but she saw through that. She’s got something against older dudes, so we were hoping you might be able to help. You’re Carla’s age, right?”

 

“I guess,” Jon shrugged. He didn’t know her that well. “I didn’t really talk to her, though.”

 

“But you weren’t an asshole, either?” Billie asked. Jon shook his head. He’d never done or said anything mean to Carla in the month that he knew her. Admittedly, he’d never done anything to stop the bullying, but he was hoping that these three (and Carla’s ghost) wouldn’t hold that against him. Billie nodded. “Then you two should be fine. We just have to figure out if there’s an easier way to communicate with her.”

 

Jon leaned in. “What’ve you been trying? Also, I’m against ouija boards, so if that’s the plan, I’m out.”

 

“No ouija boards,” Billie said. “Got it.”

 

“We’ve been using what’s left of her journal, but it’s not always easy to make out what she’s saying,” Tre said. “We’ve tried going to where she hung herself, and occasionally we’ve been able to get glimpses of her, but she never stays. She says she’s afraid of men.”

 

“Maybe something happened to her while she was alive,” Jon said, thinking about how Cassie always avoided one specific uncle of hers and how he, Alex, and Tom had smashed the guy’s windows on the Fourth of July one year as revenge. “Maybe a teacher or an older relative molested her or whatever.”

 

“That’s what we were thinking,” Billie said. He frowned. “We need more girls on this. Not just because people trust girls easier, but because girls are badass and strong as hell.”

 

“We’ll talk to your Arizona sweetheart later,” Tre said. Mike snorted, and Jon realised he was missing a joke between friends. 

 

“Anyway,” Billie said, drawing out the word, “since she’d not comfortable talking to someone older, we were hoping you could try. All we know is that she’s not vicious or angry, and that she can’t rest until she shares her message. Are you interested?”

 

“Um,” Jon said. “Sure. What do I tell my grandparents?”

 

“Whatever you need to,” Mike said. “You’ve got a trusting face. They’ll probably believe whatever bullshit you give them.”

 

* * *

 

Jon’s grandparents believed him when he said he’d made friends with some guys from school and they’d formed a study group. Neither of his grandparents asked to meet Jon’s friends, so Jon figured that Mike had been right and he really did have a trusting face. 

 

The guys had agreed to talk to Carla during the day so that Jon wouldn’t get freaked out, and they promised not to leave him alone. Carla had killed herself in the woods behind the local park. The police tape had been taken down because the death had been easily confirmed as a suicide, so there wasn’t anything keeping them from the area.

 

“I’m going to hang out with my friends!” Jon called while he was standing at the front door. 

 

“Alright, but be home before nine,” his grandmother said. “You’ve got school tomorrow, and I want you to get a full night’s rest.”

 

“I will,” Jon promised, and then left the house. He locked it up behind himself, and pocketed the key. He had his spell book in his backpack, even though Mike had said they wouldn’t need it. It was just a comfort to have around, in case anything bad started to happen again. Jon didn’t want to be unprepared. 

 

He walked to the front of the neighbourhood, where Billie said he and the other two would be waiting to pick Jon. Jon recognised the car immediately, and jogged up to it before pulling on the door handle so that he could get in. He couldn’t tell if he was scared or excited, but he was shivering with nerves as they drove to the park. 

 

It was strangely quiet. Most people had stopped taking their kids there after Carla’s body had been found. It made sense. No one wanted to be hanging around the site of a suicide. 

 

Jon followed the other three through the woods. There were some paths, but they didn’t stay on them. It was a ten minute walk out to where Carla had hung herself. The noose was still there. Jon shivered. He could feel her presence, but unlike with Chicago, she didn’t scare him. She just felt sad.

 

Jon swallowed. “Carla? Are you out there?”

 

_ Make them leave _ , her voice whispered through the trees. Jon jumped and pulled his backpack closer. His heart pounded, and he looked around, trying to spot her. He could feel his hands shaking. “Where are you?”

 

_ I’ll show myself if you make them leave, _ she said.  _ They scare me.  _

 

“Well, um, you scare me to,” Jon said. “How about my friends just step back a little, and then we can face each other, make this a lot less scary, and talk things out. Okay?”

 

There was a moment of silence. All Jon could hear was his own breathing. It was still cold, even for February. Then,  _ okay _ . Jon watched as Carla shimmered into life. She was dressed in a long black dress, with Joan Jett hair. Just like she had been when she was alive. There was a giant purple bruise around her neck, though, and she was wringing her hands nervously. 

 

Jon waved. “Hi.”

 

She smiled at him.  _ You’re the new kid. You always looked so sad on the bus. What happened to you? _

 

“A ghost killed my family and three of my friends and then tried to kill me,” Jon said. He glanced over his shoulder. Billie, Tre, and Mike were still within sight, but they were about twenty feet away from him and Carla. “I, um, I guess I’m here because I don’t want you to stay around here too long and turn bitter.”

 

_ I don’t want to stay around here either _ , Carla said. She frowned and Jon flinched back. She tilted her head to the left.  _ Did I do something wrong? You just flinched? _

 

“I… sorry,” Jon said. “I didn’t mean to.”

 

_ It’s okay _ , Carla said.  _ I would flinch whenever my male teachers walked by my desk. I had a teacher who would touch me, when I was younger. I never told anyone except my boyfriend, because I thought he loved me. _

 

“I’m sorry about that, by the way,” Jon said. “He seemed like a real jerk.”

 

Carla laughed.  _ He was. And, I wanted to tell my sister that I’m sorry and I love her very much. Also, can you maybe tell my ex-boyfriend’s new girlfriend that he’s a fickle little shit? I’m assuming you’re here to pass on my messages, right? _

 

“Yeah,” Jon said. “That’s what my friends were trying to do. Do you want me to tell them what you just told me, or should I go and tell your sister and the other girl myself?”

 

_ You should do it. I trust you. _

 

“You don’t know me,” Jon said. “We just happened to ride the same bus.”

 

_ You trusted me even though I was a ghost _ , she argued.  _ You’re brave, and I trust you with my secrets. I want to rest, Jon.  _

 

Jon nodded. “I’ll tell your sister and the other girl.”

 

* * *

 

After Jon told Carla’s sister, and her ex’s new girl, what Carla had told him, he returned to where Carla had died. Billie went with him, but there was nothing there. The noose was gone, too. It was a normal amount of cold. 

 

Jon turned around. “She’s gone.”

 

“Then our job is done,” Billie said. 

 

“Are you guys leaving, then?” Jon asked. He didn’t want them to go. Those three guys had made him feel more at home than he had since his family died. He crossed his arms over his chest. “Can I come with you?”

 

“Are you sure?” Billie asked. “It’s not a fun life.”

 

“It’s better than being in Cincinnati and having everyone treat me like I’m really fragile,” Jon said. It was true. His grandparents treaded lightly around him, and the kids at school all stared at him like he was a weirdo. It was like they knew he was an orphan and were treating him as a freak because of it. “I’m a witch, Billie, and I’m good at this. I don’t really have a future, so it’s not like I’m throwing away anything by doing this.”

 

Billie nodded. “You’ve got a point.”

 

“Really?” Jon asked, standing up taller. “When are we leaving and where are we going?”

 

“We can leave tomorrow, but you can’t bring a lot of stuff with you,” Billie said. “The car’s pretty full. And we’re going to go down to New Orleans to talk with some people about setting up a home base in the back of someone’s voodoo shop.”

 

“Is it your Arizona girl?” 

 

“She’s not my Arizona girl, but she is from Arizona,” Billie said, leading Jon back out of the forest. He glanced over his shoulder and pointed at Jon. “And she will kick your ass if you call her that to her face, so be careful kid.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! If you enjoyed, please leave a comment/kudos!


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